"One of our best American writers, Moira Crone gives us her finest book yet, a story as dazzling and dangerous as ice. The Ice Garden is a heart-stopper. This just may be the most haunting and memorable novel you will ever read."—Lee Smith, author of Guests on Earth and The Last Girls

"Ten-year-old Claire McKenzie is the narrator of this wonderful novel, and her far-too-soon passage into adulthood is at the core of this great-hearted but never sentimental book. Moira Crone is an immensely talented writer, and all of her gifts are in full display in The Ice Garden." —Ron Rash, author of Nothing Gold Can Stay and Serena

"The pages fly by in The Ice Garden, Moira Crone’s powerful new novel that, despite its title, burns with a glowing white heat. A young girl, Claire McKenzie, narrates her life with a mother trapped in the suffocating culture of the South in the sixties, a father too dazzled by his wife to notice his daughter, and the brand-new sister she adores. Moira Crone’s ability to capture feeling in words and to make those words sing is remarkable and memorable. I read the book straight through, shocked, riveted, and in awe."—Kelly Cherry, author of A Kind of Dream: Stories

Ten-year-old Claire adores her brand-new baby sister, but her mother doesn't feel the same. Trapped in the suffocating culture of the small-town South in the early 1960s, Claire's mother tries to cope with her own mental illness and all the expectations placed upon a woman of her class. While Claire's father remains too dazzled by his beautiful wife to recognize the impending dangers, Claire is left largely on her own to save herself and her baby sister--with mesmerizing and shocking consequences.

Moira Crone, whose works have appeared in The New Yorker, Oxford American, and Fiction, is the award-winning author of six books, including her newest novel The Ice Garden. Her previous book, The Not Yet, was a finalist for the Philip K. Dick Award for best science fiction paperback of the year in 2013. In 2009, she received the Robert Penn Warren Award from the Southern Fellowship of Writers for the body of her work. She will lead a fiction workshop titled "World-Building" at the North Carolina Writers' Network 2014 Fall Conference. www.moiracrone.com.